There are seasons in life for everything. I’ve handed that five pesos piece of advice out to people when they’re stuck or struggling, but I also remind myself of this fact often when I find it impossible to find the horizon line.
Right now is cockroach season. Scorpion, and centipede season. Iguana season. Snake season. Rainy season. Hurricane prep season. Summer fires doom scrolling season. The normalcy of life is punctuated by people posting their experiences of war and climate change as selfie videos. We are the frogs in the pot of boiling water. Living in 2026, is to witness mass extinction.
The cold water that stays trapped off most of July, left early this year. You can tell because the land sweats. Water is suddenly abundant in the air, the heat is intense. It’s a collective sigh after a long wait for moisture. The birds are louder now. This time a year, there’s less people. It’s hot.
Don’t come visit now. She rejects those who have not set root. Roots that grow slowly in the desert. The summer is when she lashes out at those of us who have carved into her hillsides and coastlines with storms, heat, and dengue plague. These cycles are marked by moon rises, big glorious moons, tiny fingernail moons, big stars, bats, owls, and nighthawks. Changing currents bring different visitors. Mantas and rays. Clear water. Blue water. Then stormy green water. Fish smell. The smell of plankton. Once the water shifts to warm, creeping in currents, and turbulent swells that come from South and Southwest, critters begin to move, the locusts sing, and centipedes, scorpions, spiders, and cockroaches - so many roaches - flying roaches, small roaches, and big giant roaches - come out. Lizards run by at mid day.
After five years I learned to notice them. The shifts, subtle at times - a flower here or there, a different butterfly on the wind. And with time what comes after.
The first storms have swung by - and we are blessed - with the perfect amount of rain, and wind, there is plenty. The trees bear their fruits. Flowers abound. Cactus bloom and vines and underbrush explode in green.
We prepare though for wind, destruction and flooding. In case the water comes and decides to carve its way through ancient paths, through homes, redirected by construction, finding its path to the sea. We prepare the house. Fix hinges. Pick up things that might become projectiles in a hurricane.
By the end of November the whales arrive. It is the mark of seasons changing. First the humpbacks to show off their prowess, and skill at aerial tactics, then the greys, filling the bay with blowholes. Southern swells shift to North swells and cold water reenters. Finally the air cools and everything dries. The reptiles hide away, the little chipmunks and bunnies find it hard to find food. Pink bodies fill the beaches. And the economy returns to local businesses. Bulldozers dust up brush lands. Lines fill the stores. The break is full with surfers, some aggressive, some lost in their desire to fill out some childhood dream.
If you are in a hurry, the desert will whip you into obedience, only her rhythm is available. There is no other. For someone like Meghan who’s early life was marked by snowfall, and leaves changing colors, these seasonal changes might have at first frustrated her and seemed mild. But now after five years, I see her settling into tanlines that further their way up her arms as the sleeves on her clothes grow shorter during summer months. I watch her sitting outside a scorpion’s den at night, in complete wonder of the beauty of it all.
I will be 40 in a month. My birthday in October mirrors a seasonal peak, a step out of the frantic heat and into rainier weather. After forty years, I feel like I finally am starting to notice the same cycles in life. When something goes away, space opens for new experiences. With the recent loss of our dog Flika came lots of pain and tears - and also more freedom for our smaller dog, Gobi, who is calmer around people and less likely to bite the face of a child.
Right now I find myself once again in a life seasonal shift. It feels like I am on a ledge overlooking a giant canyon. The massive world of opportunity below, terrifying and violent, but also full of blessings and fruits to try.
For these past years I have collaborated with friends Paco Oropeza and Sandra Reyna, to run a cultural center. Its daily operations taught me spreadsheets, accounting, marketing, event planning, and the difference between a latte and a cappuccino. We did events with local artists, including workshops and exhibitions. But over time it also became a monotonous effort to keep the doors open - pay the overhead. Growth is the only way forward in capitalism, and so we naturally expanded our attention to visitors to make ends meet. There is a sharp, uncomfortable irony here: relying on the same influx of tourists to fund a space dedicated to local art and conservation. Over time, we began to worry that we had lost track of our mission to support the arts, science, and conservation in our community. Changes in the relationship with our landlords allowed us to reassess our situation, and ultimately we unanimously decided to close the space.
This change I’ve felt coming for some time, however I was unable to accept it - afraid of feeling defeat or loss. The loss of an entity - Uvas Y Hojas - a book with eyes - whose life has affected so many around us here. Some have found love there at our events, others have broken up. The place has held conversations about water, development, politics, and the things that make up a small town living in a modern world pushing in. But I feel - we feel - that it’s time to close its doors. Not to kill the project - but rather to let it live in another way. To give ourselves time. Precious time needed for other pursuits, and hopefully to make more of an impact in our community along the way. This is the season to be on the street. To be in the world.
In the last five years I have come a long way. My relationship with Meghan has grown in beautiful ways - we have a deep respect for each other that has only opened more through this. Working in a venue allowed me to spend hours and days with my dog Flika, in her life finally fully after the first five years of her life I spent on the road traveling, only seeing her for bursts at a time. I’ve taken time to study. To read, to reflect on my life, and to teach what I know. To struggle at times, and overcome that struggle.
Leaving Mexico City forced us to slow down. Way down. Almost to a halt. To become patient with life, with the way things go, and most importantly with myself. I was able to conquer past addictions from childhood. Which I struggled with for a long time. I’ve healed up my body. Became stronger. While also slowly decaying as I age. I’ve worked to be less of a machista in general. To recognize my body and what it needs. To find out I am autistic. To reframe my past. Uvas y Hojas wasn’t just a business; it was the stationary cocoon I desperately needed. Having a daily, grounded routine gave me the quiet space to finally map the workings of my own mind, to confront my history, and to build the scaffolding I needed to heal.
When I opened Uvas y Hojas I no longer knew what work I wanted to make as an artist. Instead I wanted to support others in their endeavors. I needed to rethink what photography meant to me, to let it settle. I needed to burrow, to dig in. To hibernate and wait for rain. But now that has changed. I have found my voice again. And had time to organize my thoughts. With the closing of the space, there comes new responsibilities. And excitement. Uvas y Hojas will continue. But right now it’s time for this entity we created to evolve too and crawl out from the cocoon.
I want to share the importance of following the seasons. Being in touch with the cyclical nature of things has helped me. To understand time. To feel the animate present at all times, and to foresee things. Our earth is changing her seasons, to be more dramatic. To be more violent. And to be tragic. But also at the same time I see so much growth. I see people standing up for what they believe in. We are feeling the call to act collectively.
To follow the seasons is to mourn.
To mourn the loss of things, to feel deeply what is gone in order to make space for what could be.
This is a lovely piece of writing by a man I greatly admire. It's everything I wish I'd said myself. Bravo to you and Meghan. Uvas y Hojas was/is a perfect dream of a place. We're going forward with you.